


Catalyst

by haute_coldture



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV), The Flash (TV 2014), The Flash - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Barry Allen & Iris West Friendship, Canon Temporary Character Death, Canonical Character Death, Eddie Thawne Lives, M/M, Metahuman Leonard Snart, Minor Eddie Thawne/Iris West, Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Past Barry Allen/Iris West, Slow Burn, Warnings will also change with additional chapters, no knowledge of the Infinite Crisis event really needed but there WILL be spoilers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:29:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25394644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/haute_coldture/pseuds/haute_coldture
Summary: Outside of time, Leonard Snart makes a choice to sacrifice himself for the sake of a universe he thinks he’ll never know.Across the multiverse, Barry Allen runs to save a future he thinks he won’t get to have.The new reality is one they both learn to navigate together.(A post-Infinite Crisis AU)
Relationships: Barry Allen/Leonard Snart, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added
Comments: 32
Kudos: 135





	1. Oculus, Aftermath, and Awakening

**Author's Note:**

> Knowledge of the Infinite Crisis crossover event not required, but there will be spoilers in future chapters!
> 
> This is probably the most ambitious thing I’ve tried to write in a longass time, and I anticipate I’ll hit more than a few snarls as I pull everything together. I wouldn’t have tried a word of it if I weren’t endlessly inspired by the beautiful fanwork in the ColdFlash fandom - if you’ve ever written, drawn, fanmixed, or even just posted to holler about feels for this ship, thank you; so many of y’all have inspired me to finally try my hand at contributing too, and I hope if nothing else EVERY PERSON who takes the time to read this knows how very much I appreciate you ♥
> 
> Enormous thanks to the lovely folks who kindly beta-read and whose feedback helped me finish this first chapter: Luna Shimizu, [Hidden_In_Smoak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hidden_In_Smoak), [Fancy_Dragonqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fancy_Dragonqueen), and [blueelvewithwings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueelvewithwings). 
> 
> And all my love for the ColdFlash Discord server, y’all have been a bastion of joy in a time when I’ve really needed it.

Leonard Snart was no stranger to pain. It had been years since he’d flinched at the promise of harm, and could still hold someone’s eye down the barrel of a threat while cutting them with words sharper than any knife. Had to. It was the only way he’d survived long enough to be standing here; outside of time at the end of the universe, with his hand stuck in his own tombstone as he watched the closest notion he had to ‘friends’ sprint away toward safety.

Mick’s last conscious look of confusion had just begun contorting into something like fury when Len’s fist had connected. Still, an echo of his partner’s voice threatened him against whatever stupid thing he was about to do, but Len refused to hear it. His last human touch came from the reformed assassin who turned out to be the one who stole a kiss from _him._ Sara’s final fleeting glance wasn’t pity; she held his eyes with a calm understanding that Len knew would haunt him if he had any longer to dwell on it.

Best that he didn’t, he supposed; instead, he braced himself for whatever flashbang of pain would accompany this idiotic sacrificial last hurrah. He didn’t want to pinpoint the moment he knew this was how he’d go out. He suspected if he could flip back through his own greatest hits, he’d find the marker tucked between pages dedicated to his sister; shaped like a crooked grin clad in lightning and red leather.

But that had all been part of their orchestration too, hadn’t it? All of them making puppets dance for some grand universal bureaucracy. He wrenched at the bitter resentment and fury roiling through him to help steady his hand.

“There are no strings on me,” Len bit out as he savored the last moments of his greatest score; stealing back free will.

Blinding white surrounded him — almost comfortably familiar, like his cold gun’s glare — then every sense was awash in _too much._ Explosive tinnitus ricocheted through him as if he’d become a new state of matter, his sense of self winded by the onslaught.

Len wondered if this was where most people would have screamed.

❅

This part of death felt a bit like riding a cosmic roller coaster, forever climbing up toward an inevitable drop.

He’s counting the seconds reflexively, and it’s been nearly a minute when he feels the full-body dissonance rattling through his atoms begin to subside.

After eighty-three seconds, it’s as if his entire body is pins and needles awakening from having been asleep - discomfort, but not pain.

At one hundred and seventeen seconds, Len runs his body through the same checks he always does when evaluating for injuries - slow methodical stretches and flexes, taking stock.

At one hundred and forty-three seconds, Len opens his eyes.

In Len’s youth, Lewis had scoffed disdainfully at the bright fantastical fictions Len gravitated toward, which - of course - ensured that he’d read every scrap of science fiction and fantasy he could get his hands on. Countless stories had woven visions of wonder in his imagination over the years, some of it even taking root before the harsh reality of his life tore the dreams of stars from his night skies. Impossible things had become commonplace lately in the world he thought he knew, running through his city like the beat of a new pulse. Then the Waverider had shown him the timestream. The first night he’d tried to settle into his bunk aboard the ship, he’d felt a stuttering gasp from someplace buried deep inside himself that made every night a little less sleepless, and a little more hopeful.

None of it prepared him for how the universe wrapped around him now in an infinite embrace.

It wasn’t just endless spirals of starlight and empty black, it was everything in-between.  
All the _life._  
Countless lifetimes, linked together across civilizations and species and planets, time and dimensions and _multiverses_ and—  
Somehow, in all of it, a salty thief from a merry band of misfits bumbling through time had set off a cascade through everything when the Oculus had ceased to be.

Leonard Snart saw the flow of the universe and he wept.

A sense of serenity eventually pulled his shaking breaths back to normal. His internal count had long since fallen silent, overwhelmed by the enormity of understanding what scale in a cosmic sense meant.

The ripples of their actions spread through all of it. Len reeled with the revelation that if this was the culmination of every miserable second of his life, it had been worth it to do _this_. Len felt himself drifting through introspection as he tried to process the unfathomable fact that his actions at the end of his criminal blip of a life had changed _everything._

His own cocoa-warm words echoed back to him from a living room forever ago, “Sorry, I’m not interested in being a hero.”

“Well you’re doing a pretty lousy job of being a villain this week,” Barry had responded then, still vehemently believing so stubbornly in Leonard Snart being someone he wasn’t, not yet - not then, anyway.

The words were chased by a repetition, but Barry’s voice was softer in the refrain, holding a note of fond teasing that hit closer to admiration than admonishment. “ _Well you’re doing a pretty lousy job of being a villain this week_ ,” Barry smiled kindly in a moment that hadn’t happened for this Leonard Snart.

It reminded him of the way Barry had looked at him in Siberia — Len realized: Barry _knew._  
The universe crystallized Len’s certainty that the Flash he’d met then had already done his mourning for Captain Cold.  
The ache in Barry’s gaze Len had attributed to worry for Iris suddenly sent him second-guessing if the Scarlet Speedster had been, in his way, saying goodbye.

Len choked out a wet laugh at the thought that the Flash had bent the rules of time to take his chilly nemesis on one last heist.

It was a kindness Lisa deserved, but wouldn’t get. Len knew Mick would be the one to tell her, in his haltingly gruff way.  
She’d know before he said a word, though.  
It wouldn’t surprise him if Sara insisted on going along, too. Lisa wouldn’t appreciate her at first, but Sara seemed impervious to the Snart brand of cold shoulder. He could see them becoming dangerously good friends once they figured out how to sharpen their grief into purpose.

Len hoped Lisa would aim herself toward a better, kinder horizon than the one they’d come from. At least everything he’d been saving up for her over the years could help ensure she never had to work for anything if she didn’t want to. She could choose for herself now; no invisible hand could tug her strings any longer.

And so he spun, revisiting memories of himself until he realized he was knowing and seeing things that Leonard Snart couldn’t possibly know or see.

Lisa’s practice in an ice rink Len had never visited, her hair held trapped by a wide headband after she’d decided she wanted to cut her own bangs.

Mick with a baby in his arms and a smile that held more love than the man himself had ever known.

Sara Lance falling, _Ta-er al-Safher_ rising.

Ray with a magnifying glass an inch from his nose as he delicately pressed the tinning wire to the tip of a soldering iron.

Rip complaining about getting out of bed, a woman beside him laughing.

Jax slamming his shoulder into a practice dummy as the scent of fresh-cut grass chased him down the field.

Stein raking a hand through his hair as he stared down a formula as if demanding the solution from the cosmos itself.

The Hawks, as they were at the start of everything, kohl-rimmed eyes smiling under a desert sunset.

His mother’s smile for the man his father once was.

A young boy screaming for his mother in a lightning storm.

The copper tang painting Len’s teeth from the solid punch Mick owed him but he’d never get.

Lisa laughing so openly, so _honestly_ , as she leaned into someone else’s shoulder with a fondness that seized in Len’s heart.

CSI Barry Allen in his lab, hand on a chain moments before the universe tilted back his chin with a bolt of change.

On it went, flitting through moments like someone was browsing channels on TV and he had no idea who held the remote.  
When it settled, Len found his cognizance focused on the docks of Central City, then a familiar bar nearby.  
The neon cut out his silhouette as if he were pasted from the pages of a comic book, and Mick stood beside him gathering words between his brows.

Mick had ground out, “You’re the best guy I ever knew. You may not think you’re a hero, but you’re a hero to me. You got that?”

Len remembered the ghost of something he couldn’t quite define back then when he responded, “Yeah. I got it.”

Mick parted with an abrupt, “See ya ‘round,” and Len had turned the encounter over for hours after. It hadn’t fit then, but now—

Ah.  
So that had been Mick’s goodbye.

But then—

There was more, _endlessly_ more that threatened to overwhelm him; the universe held him away from it, though, and he knew the vast potential of reality splintered and branched in ways that would undo him If he let himself look. His sense of rebelliousness was quelled by a greater bid for self-preservation, whatever that even meant any more, and Len didn’t push.

His focus shifted, soothed, recentered as Len felt something like his heartbeat hammering in his temple. The sight before him now was vignetted, and he was alone in a safehouse staring at nothing in particular, jaw working in thought. There was nothing remarkable about this night or this moment, but it had dug in roots that haunted him. Len had been alone with himself and his own thoughts too long, cracked open in introspection that made him realize he wasn’t sure he knew what it felt like to be happy.

The next day, he’d been counting successful seconds on the latest score when he was knocked to the asphalt by the impossible.

Spiraling arms of galaxies wrapped around him in a way that was as unsettling as it was comforting, and it felt almost as if there was a gentle hand on his shoulder turning him to look— _there._

A plasma-bright yellow pinprick of motion danced across his vision and Len felt goosebumps rise like they always did when the speedster ran into his orbit. It wasn’t like looking down on Earth in the serene way of all the documentaries; it was more as if a maelstrom of events coalesced around him. The Flash sped through them all, and sometimes more trails of lightning-bright plasma ran alongside him, all in different hues and crackling with barely-contained potential. Len’s sense of time had redefined itself, but he knew following the flow of that lightning went on for a while as he watched and waited to see what happened.

He’d been too intent to initially notice when the rest of the universe around him softened, then dimmed, into nothing.  
The yellow-bright fork of lightning branched out to split, then rejoin with itself; again, then again, countless paths seeking something across all of it in a burst, tracing Lichtenberg figures through realities.

He heard Lisa scream.

His consciousness whipped toward the direction it came from and found nothing but an empty echo.  
Her voice came again, a soft gasp — again, he found nothing.  
Len lurched toward the realities the universe had gently said weren’t for him, and in its enormity, he’d acquiesced without truly understanding. Now, though, he pushed past the universe’s warning, and with the deft instincts of the thief who’d stolen back free will, Len pilfered those realities to find his sister.

In this one, her Olympic golds shone brightly from their display in the midday sun filtering in through the windows.

In another, she playfully wrestled with a younger brother and rubbed a knuckle affectionately into his familiar widow’s peak.

In that one, she blew a kiss chased by a Cheshire grin half-hidden behind slitted goggles, cool blue light tracing her cheek from the gun she held aloft.

A mayor, a singer, a dancer, a mother, a brother, a dazzling heroine, a feared queen of the underworld; spirals of potential people who were all their reality’s version of Lisa Snart.  
In many, he saw snatches of himself and felt something crash in his heart.

Another sound of alarm reached him. Whomever that Lisa had been, she was gone — no, her _reality_ was gone.  
An angry curse cut off mid-breath, chased by a defiant yell, joined by her furious scream of, “NO!” — Lisa’s voice called out from one reality after another before his sense of her lessened when they fell silent.

Len tore at the universe, demanded an undoing, and felt that whisper of something like a hand guide his attention away as if shielding him from the worst of it. He lashed out, howling wordless and primal, curling around the vestiges of what he sacrificed everything to protect.

Lightning danced around him, a yellow-bright streak that seemed to trace the shape of each reality; as if it could be a shield from whatever was coming if only it could move fast enough.

It couldn’t.

Snatches of despair and fear and darkness crowded into the spaces where realities once were, nothingness yawning in a slow creep to consume more. Around Len, the arms of the universe felt lesser, and dread shook in his instincts the way a bad situation always did. The phantom band of a ring no longer around his pinkie finger was a reminder and warning he wished he could heed.

One by one, the realities ceased, and through them all a bolt of impossible lightning tried to run fast enough to stop it.

The multiverse shuddered like it was dragging in one last gasp, and Len felt something like the pulse of his soul stutter. Too-familiar blinding white shot through everything again. This time, though, a flicker of yellow danced on the edge daring hope to flare in him.

❅

Leonard Snart woke up slowly, luxuriating in the whisper of an embrace that lingered in the curve of the bedsheets around him, perfectly languid and sleep-warm. Soft light illuminated the room in the diffused glow of an early morning. Drawing in a conscious slow breath, he reveled in the faint notes of lavender and spice from the aromatherapy aid he used to ease his thoughts before bed.

His waking mind was slow to thaw, so as he rolled onto one side Len blinked his eyes open to survey what was eerily familiar yet unknown to him. The room had all the hallmarks of his taste, functionally minimal but neatly showcasing personal touches that were as close as he ever got to making a place into a home. An old photo frame sat beside a battered copy of _The Scarlet Pimpernel_ , a hook on the back of the door suspending one of his holsters. Len’s fingers curled around the familiar shape of a pistol tucked against the mattress, where he always keeps it.

It had all the right traits of a room he’d call his, but he had never been here before in his life.

Speaking of the whole _life_ thing.

Len slid from the bed to his feet with silent ease. The bare hardwood beneath his toes didn’t creak as he moved about the room, weapon in hand, and listened at the crack of his door. Part of him was on autopilot as he investigated his surroundings, eyes darting to catalog every corner. The other part of him still felt like he was waking up from whatever the fuck had happened with the Oculus at the Vanishing Point. If he closed his eyes, the afterimage of lightning dancing through nebulas still lingered; none of this was right.

Slowly, Len opened the door of the bedroom and continued his sweep of the space. The short hall first revealed a dark doorway into a bathroom, but otherwise led into a living room and kitchen. An apartment, then. Taking stock, Len crept silently through it all, the muzzle of his pistol leading where his gaze followed. Everything fit as if he’d lived in this place for months.

He began investigating more thoroughly, all the while turning over his recollection and trying to make sense of it.

Footsteps outside made him pause, the gait striking a familiar staccato of sharp heels on low-pile carpet, and Len’s pulse leapt into his throat at the sound of a key in the lock.

Lisa let herself in like she always did, with the decisiveness of someone who knew she had nothing to fear, the scent of coffee and cinnamon following in her wake. She launched into a rant involving how the coffee shop messed up her first order, could you believe it, so she’d had to wait for them to fix it but at least she’d gotten free pastries out of it and—

Len watched her move through the kitchen like a comfortable force of nature, and if there was a little hitch in his breath, she wasn’t paying attention to him to see it.

She propped herself against the counter and sipped at her coffee, finally looking at him. Len could tell the moment she noticed something was off. Lisa frowned, “What’s wrong?”

He had years of practice to fall back on when he sidestepped the truth with his response. “Thought I heard something, but it was probably just one of the neighbors.” Len relinquished the numb grip he had on his pistol, setting it down on a section of nearby countertop.

As he reached for the cup she had brought for him, Lisa’s keen gaze followed him. “Just the neighbors?” She asked, open-ended; giving him the ease of her doubt because she always did.

Len stalled with a sip to revel in the flood of warm spices from fresh chai with a hint of honey. “Probably,” he hedged, before sipping again, his aloofness perfectly calculated down to the jut of his hip against the lower cabinets.

For anyone else, that would have been enough; he was an excellent liar. But she knew him too well.

“Lenny,” she started in a way he’d ached to hear again, “if this is about—”

“It’s about the Waverider,” he cut her off, a thread of still-raw truth to it he hadn’t expected to sneak out. She wasn’t expecting him to say anything at all, but she waited patiently for him to continue.

The cup in Len’s hands probably should have been a warm comfort to him, but it instead felt numb where he tried to keep his hands from going white-knuckled around it. Holding it was a cheap anchor, he knew; he felt half-gagged if he couldn’t speak with his hands flitting through the air to add punctuation as he went, but he knew it would just give more away than he was ready to discuss at the moment.

“I’m still,” he took his time to find words to encompass _what,_ “.. processing things. I just need some time, Lise, before I’m ready to talk through it.” It was more honest than he initially realized, but let his brevity settle into the air between them with a hesitant flick of his gaze to read her.

She regarded him with the open concern he expected, and the patient smile he never deserved. “Okay, Lenny. You know I’m here for you no matter what, though, right? Don’t make me threaten you with a hug. Even if I end up frosted, it’d be worth it.” She aimed a playful pout his way.

Len visibly relaxed at her shifting the mood, and he offered a small, but genuine, smile. “Love you too, trainwreck.”

Lisa laughed fondly, digging into the bag to retrieve one of the cinnamon pastries. “Jerk.”

They spent the morning more domestically than Len ever thought would be possible; it was mundane and uneventful and boring and _perfect._

When he finally does hug her a little tighter before sending her off, he keeps the crash of emotions at bay until he closes the door quietly behind her, listening for the sound of her retreating footsteps and concentrating on his breathing for eighty-seven seconds. Then he’s sinking to his knees as a breathless sob wrenches free of him.

His vision blurs with tears, and an unfamiliar numb tingle traces over his cheeks. Len reaches up to scrub the heel of his palm across his eyes, puzzled by the odd sensation.

Blinking down at what he sees in his hands, he gets to his feet and is in the bathroom within moments, hand slapping at the wall to find the light switch. He squints against the sudden brightness but stares at himself in the mirror.

Frost rimes the tips of his eyelashes in soft white, and the thinnest trail of ice still streaks one cheek in a tracery of his fallen tears. His hands, he notices, look no different, but...

Len moves quickly back to the kitchen, snatching up where he’d abandoned his cup of chai after half-strangling it in an attempt to ground himself through Lisa’s questioning. He all but rips the lid free to inspect its contents, and finds the liquid frozen.

A shuddering breath hitches as Len stares down at his frozen drink, and it feels like the dam retaining his tenuous hold on his composure cracks.

_“Fuck.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SO UH  
> HERE WE GO
> 
> I absolutely am very much outside my comfort zone with writing this but I really hope folks enjoy it. 
> 
> I’ve got this story mostly outlined and am trying to keep a chapter ahead before posting as I go, which I sure hope doesn’t end up biting me in the ass. Rough estimate is around 10 chapters total right now, though!  
> Thank you so very much for reading through this! I’d be delighted to know what you think ♥
> 
> You can also find me on the ColdFlash Discord server, or at [hautecoldture.tumblr.com](https://hautecoldture.tumblr.com)


	2. Earth-Prime, Good As New

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One month after the events of the Crisis have seen the multiverse reborn, Barry Allen is still coping with the shape of the new world around him. His brunch plans fall through, but then his day takes an entirely unexpected turn thanks to a familiar new meta.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some far-reaching liberties taken with one particular detail of the Crisis, but mostly kept a lot of it pretty close to canon. I tend to not enjoy direct-canon coda when I read it, so I tried to keep the summary of what went down as brief but understandable as possible.
> 
> So many thanks again to the lovely folks who took the time to kindly beta-read and encourage me through this chapter: Luna Shimizu, [Fancy_Dragonqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fancy_Dragonqueen), and [Kasai_Hasumi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kasai_Hasumi).  
>   
> And, as always, much love to the ColdFlash Discord server. You all continue to inspire me ♥

Barry’s leg bounced under the table as he flicked open the lock screen of his phone. No new messages waited for his attention, but he opened up the last thread to re-read through it. He was early, probably tempting fate or some other cosmic law about the universal balance. They had already rescheduled this several times, though, and he didn’t want to risk being at fault for it happening again.

The sunny corner bistro was one he’d never been to, but Iris had raved about their brunch menu for years. He’d already read through the entire thing cover-to-cover six times in the few minutes since he’d sat down, and everything on it looked _great_ , but food was the furthest thing from his mind.

His phone’s screen dimmed from inactivity, but the change still drew his eyes to it. Little things about this new unified Multiverse still caught him off-guard, like the emblem in the top-left of his screen for a cellular carrier that hadn’t existed in his reality. Or the layout of the precinct where there were somehow five more stairs up to his lab than there had been before. Or the flavor of Diet Coke (an improvement, thankfully).

Big things about the new world were exponentially harder for him to process.

Like how Kara’s universe joining his reality meant aliens living on Earth was _normal_ now (and he mourned getting to share the delight of adapting to that with Cisco; they’d had more late-night meandering conversations about life in the universe than Barry could count). Or how Lex Luthor set himself up to be a whole new kind of Paragon smiling out from magazine covers and effusive think pieces about the meaning of magnanimity. Oh, and can’t forget how half the foes he’d faced as the Flash were now different enough that Barry felt like he needed a crash-course refresher on his own history.

Or that Oliver was gone.

Then there was Iris.

The woman he loved, for whom a carefully-hidden, precious ring box had migrated between pants pockets for _weeks_ before he finally worked up the nerve to propose. Their wedding ceremony hadn’t been perfect (understatement), but it was still one of the happiest days of his life.

And _Nora—_

Barry’s phone came to life with a new message, and he snatched it up to read.

 **_Iris:_** || _Joy’s running a fever and the pediatrician is working her into the schedule this afternoon. Raincheck?_

Barry’s chest tightened with disappointment and concern, thumbs moving only a little faster than might be normal.

 **_Barry:_** || _Oh no is there anything I can do?_ _  
_ || _We can brunch anytime, kiddo comes first!_

He watched the little dancing ellipses indicating her typing a response, biting his lip.

 **_Iris_ : **|| _Thanks Barry. I’ll keep you updated and If anything comes up I know you’d be here in a flash to help if we need you ;)_

Barry felt himself wilting in the uncomfortable bistro chair even as he typed out a response.

 **_Barry_ : **|| _Always, Iris._

His phone screen played a short reaction animation indicating Iris had ‘loved’ the message and Barry’s gut twisted. After staring at the screen for another several seconds, he finally put it down on the table in front of him when there was clearly no further update coming. He hated that he started wondering if she was making an excuse to avoid him again. Not that he could blame her. It still felt like the dust was settling from their last tense conversation, and he knew he had no right to hold any of it against her. This Iris wasn’t _his_ Iris — not the way she had been.

Not since the Crisis.

#### ⚡️

It happened like this:

A cosmically-powerful being who called himself The Monitor showed up last year ( _god_ , had it only been a year ago?), grimly proclaiming portents of doom and an impending Crisis. Barry had been staring down the headline of a newspaper from the future for too long not to make the connection immediately. Even if the byline and date on the page hadn’t always been consistent, the headline remained the same: 

**_FLASH MISSING_ **

**_VANISHES IN CRISIS_ **

The cryptic warnings from The Monitor as he traveled between the parallel Earths of the multiverse had unsettled all of the heroes, but to Barry, it had started a countdown. Even if he didn’t know what it meant, he was determined to find a way to disprove The Monitor’s declaration that “In order for billions to survive the coming Crisis, the Flash must make the ultimate sacrifice and die.”

So Barry ran; aimed himself toward the day after his supposed demise to see the shape of the future without the Flash, but collided with a wall of antimatter that nearly unmade him. 

Then he enlisted the aid of the foremost expert on antimatter — Earth-3’s former Flash, Jay Garrick — and found another way to see what the future might hold. Physically breaking through the antimatter wall was impossible, but Garrick devised a way to project Barry’s mind forward, past the antimatter, to seek what solutions he could find.

Barry had come back to consciousness screaming, tears streaking his cheeks as he bleakly recounted what he saw beyond the antimatter. Billions of possible futures destroyed, billions of deaths, and the only hope he found for any of them was to sacrifice himself to save them.

When the Crisis finally began, antimatter ripped through the multiverse and realities ceased. One by one, countless Earths were subsumed into nothingness. Their greatest chance relied on using the Book of Destiny, a cosmic tome that could reshape reality, but was so powerful that only a select few could wield it. Those capable of focusing its enormity of potential were called Paragons; seven extraordinary individuals whom the Monitor declared the greatest of heroes who might stand a chance of succeeding. The Flash was the Paragon of Love, and Barry — for the first time since The Monitor had spoken of his imminent demise — felt his hope flare.

In the end, The Monitor’s words — like most cryptic prophecies — came to pass, just not in the way they had anticipated.

The Flash did die; he had been The Flash of Earth-90, who temporarily stole Barry’s speed in order to spend his last breath stopping the wave of antimatter.

But.

The “ultimate sacrifice” of The Monitor’s words hadn’t been speaking of that.

When the Multiverse was reborn, it spiraled anew in countless directions and infinitudes, realities branching out with renewed life and endless new potentials. The worlds of the Paragons became one in a new shared reality that was shaped by both their ideals and their sacrifices, channeled through a scrap from the Book of Destiny. They made the best new world that they could.

But they couldn’t save everything of the reality that had been; in order to create the new multiverse, each Paragon sacrificed something precious of their ideal.

For Barry Allen, the Flash who was a Paragon, his ultimate sacrifice was of his love.

So in the new reality that crystallized, Barry found solace in knowing she was alive — Iris West-Thawne, who had been happily married to Eddie for years and had the most beautiful daughter in the world, Joy, who lived up to her name like her laugh was what summoned the sun to rise. Joe and Cecile were the world’s most adoring grandparents, and Wally the best Uncle — second only to Barry.

Barry, who had never been her husband. Whom she only loved as a brotherly friend.

Only the seven Paragons remembered the multiverse as it had been. The rest of the world around them proceeded as if nothing had changed, unaware of the Crisis that had ended and then restarted reality. J’onn (The Paragon of Honor, known also as Martian Manhunter, formerly of Earth-38) began seeking out the others in their new reality, and he was able to use his telepathy to help more remember the world as it had been.

So when J’onn had offered to help Iris remember, he had done so with grave sincerity that it may not be possible, but that he was willing to try. Barry hadn’t known what to tell him. Ultimately, Barry knew it wasn’t his choice; it was hers. So when he finally talked to her, he’d tried not to rush into things and unleash a deluge of world-shattering revelations. But when he started talking, he didn’t stop until he realized she had been quiet for a long while.

She had asked him to give her the space to think and the time to process what he’d told her. Of course he’d been glad to, and he knew he probably looked like the world’s most pathetic kicked puppy when he’d reassured her she should take all the time she needed. He wanted to defer to her judgment on how to handle things with Joe, so even the man who was like a second father to him still didn’t know the extent of what had been hanging over Barry since the multiverse was reset.

#### ⚡️

That had been weeks ago, and their reasons for meeting up again — not even to discuss _that_ , just to do mundane things like brunch — kept falling through. Flash business or a scare with Eddie in the field or a scoop for the newspaper or, now, Joy’s fever.

Barry raked a hand through his hair, dragging in a breath as he took a moment to close his eyes and just focus on keeping his shit together. He didn’t want to start spiraling down this train of thought while sitting alone at a table in an otherwise-cheerful bistro full of strangers. He should at least make it back to the privacy of his own (lonely, messy, one-bedroom) apartment where he could shove his face into a pillow and scream.

The sound of the chair across from him scraping against the floor and the slight rustle of movement snapped Barry’s eyes open.

“Blue _really_ isn’t your color,” Snart drawled from the seat at the other side of the table, propping his chin in the palm of his hand. “Hello, Barry.”

The unexpected company derailed Barry’s thoughts from dreary wallowing into more polite social graces, though he knew the little smile he offered in greeting was feeble at best as his brows danced from confusion to polite curiosity. “Hey Leo! Didn’t know you were in town. Is Ray here too? Hope he’s ready to get his ear talked off about the multiverse resetting again,” Barry relaxed into a much more natural grin.

The other man’s expression tightened, disinterested gaze sliding briefly to something over Barry’s shoulder. “Raymond? Pretty sure he’s still off with the other time bandits aboard the Waverider. They’re apparently keeping busy with all the—,” he flicked the fingers of his hand as if to fill in what words couldn’t. Snart’s eyes were back on Barry now, watching him keenly.

Barry blinked and tried again, “No, I meant— uh, your Ray?”

Snart tilted his head but said nothing, as if he expected Barry to clarify.

Barry glanced toward the other man’s bare left hand where his fingers curled loosely against his chin, and wasn’t sure what to make of it when he didn’t see the usual band of silver there. He’d visited Ray and Leo last week when they’d invited him over for dinner in their obscenely perfect loft in Coast City. Everything had seemed fine between them (Barry tried not to dwell on the envious clench in his chest at seeing how very in love they were), and neither man was the type to shed the symbol of their union without damn good reason. They’d fought too long and too hard for it.

The other man’s jaw worked for a moment as he pieced together words. “I think we should have a chat, Scarlet.”

Barry’s entire body went rigid — Leo never called him that.

Barry’s brain ran through possibilities; Cisco hadn’t mentioned that this new reality’s version of Captain Cold was any different from how he’d been before, and Barry knew he’d checked. So then, was this some new version of the old Leonard Snart? No, he dismissed that line of thought immediately; he’d already mentioned knowing about the Waverider, and about the Crisis, but the Legends hadn’t come out on the other side of this new multiverse with a new-old-crewmember aboard their ship. He didn’t fit any of that, but...

Barry’s gaze narrowed and found the shape of the smirk sitting across from him was something he’d last seen in a Siberian forest.

“ _Snart_?” Barry hissed incredulously, leaning forward to scrutinize him. Now that he was looking for it, Barry kicked himself for ever mistaking Leo’s softer mirth for the sharp thief. This man held angles of predatory confidence that made Barry’s eyes immediately look for the cold gun where he usually wore it holstered on his thigh (it wasn’t there).

Snart’s brow tipped up in amusement. “Barry?” He said the name like it was an inside joke.

“You— _ohmigod_ how are—” Barry cut himself off, biting into his bottom lip and pulling in a deep breath. “Can we talk someplace that’s... Not here?”

“What, no brunch first?” Snart pouted in a way that reminded Barry of the thief’s sister.

“No,” Barry pushed off his chair to stand. He was grateful he’d waited to order, so had only gotten a glass of water. Still, he pulled a few bills free of his wallet and tucked them under the edge of a menu. He narrowed his eyes at Snart, then pointedly slid the menu — and tip sticking out from under it — _away_ from the thief.

Snart rolled his eyes as he stood, “Please, if you’re looking for someone stealing from the waitstaff, you should be giving their boss a rousing speech about minimum wage and health insurance.”

Barry snorted, not wanting to admit aloud that he probably had a point.

Tilting Barry a sidelong glance, Snart pushed his chair in and took an exaggerated step away from the table, flourishing a gesture. “By all means, after you.”

They exited the bistro and quickly rounded the block to find a suitably-discreet alley. Silence stretched between them with a layer of anticipatory tension Barry couldn’t put a name to, but he kept glancing over to see that the other man was still there beside him every other step.

Snart didn’t say anything, just caught Barry’s eye and raised a brow, then tilted his head toward as good a place as any to have a conversation. Barry nodded tightly and led the way into the slash of pavement between buildings, stopping short of getting too near a dumpster.

“So?” Snart cut through the tense silence between them, making the single syllable sound like several complete sentences as he propped his shoulder against the brick, interweaving his fingers together at one hip. Barry finally let himself notice that the thief’s usual aesthetic of head-to-toe blacks and navy blues hugged him in tight-fit dark denim and a waxed canvas utility jacket that boxed in the strong silhouette of his shoulders. Black gloves had made their way onto his hands, the leather fitting him like it was made to be there, and Barry realized he hadn’t noticed Snart putting them on during their short walk.

Barry wasn’t sure what to ask first, both hands tugging through his hair in a bid to jumpstart something coherent from the jumble of _how-butyoudied-whenareyoufrom-how-whatdoyouremember-how-HOW_ —

“How much do you know?” was the shape his question finally took, and Barry shoved his hands into his jacket’s pockets to quell his fidgeting (just a lightweight burgundy bomber; he’d liked it because it reminded him of his first Flash suit, but he was pretty sure it didn’t hang on him like he’d just strolled off a runway).

Snart’s eyes had landed on a fire escape, his head tilted in consideration. “More than I should, seems like.”

That both was and _wasn’t_ an answer. So Barry bit back asking anything else, hoping his silence would prompt Snart to continue. 

“Thing is, I was at The Vanishing Point.” He regarded Barry long enough to see that the speedster understood what he was talking about, and Barry nodded for the thief to continue; he did, pushing off the wall and walking a meandering path from one side of the alley to the other. “Took a page out of your book,” Snart’s curl of a smirk almost looked amused, his fingers tracing through the air as he pivoted on the ball of his foot, “and after an interesting detour, woke up to a new world order. Seems to me you know a little something about that, don’t you Barry?”

Barry pulled in a deep breath that took his shoulders up and down with it, nodding, “Yeah. Yeah I do, but.. Snart, what happened at The Vanishing Point.. You—”

“Died?” Snart cut him off, saying the word like he was tasting it for the first time. His icy gaze was on Barry’s again, and whatever he saw summoned his steps to trace a path closer to the speedster. “Apparently, it didn’t take,” he hissed through his teeth like he was daring the universe to prove him wrong.

Snart stopped an arm’s length from Barry, and they held eye contact almost long enough for it to get uncomfortable. Barry wasn’t entirely sure how to read the other man, but he could imagine the cascade of frustrating confusion wasn’t something Leonard Snart was used to experiencing.

Out of deference to what he suspected was already ill footing for the other man, Barry didn’t say what he’d been thinking; that there was no way Leonard Snart just _happened_ to run into Barry in a cute little bistro. Weirdly, knowing the thief had spied on Barry long enough to follow him there just made him more certain that this _was_ the Leonard Snart he’d known.

“I’m glad,” Barry finally blurts softly because it kicks free from the forefront of his mind and, well, it’s true. “Really, Snart, I’m glad you’re okay. But why come to me with this?”

Snart tilted a glare at Barry and took a step back, affrontedly dipping his chin. “Oh, I’m _sorry,_ silly me to think you didn’t have more important _hero_ things to do than catch up with an old dead man walking.” He turned and began stalking toward the entrance of the alley, and Barry followed after him when it was clear he didn’t intend on stopping.

“No, that’s not—hey, wait, please?” Barry gently grabbed Snart’s shoulder, “I want to— _AH!_ ” Barry yelped, snatching his hand away and looking down at it in disbelief where ice had begun to crystallize around his fingertips.

“What,” Barry breathed shakily, wide-eyed and looking at where Snart had stopped; his back still to Barry, where a light dusting of frost traced a hand-shaped outline on his shoulder.

“What? Don’t care for the cold shoulder?” Snart had turned his head enough to toss a smirk Barry’s way, one cool eye regarding the speedster warily.

Barry groaned (both at the shock of sensation and the pun), still clutching his hand to his chest; it wasn’t hurting, exactly, just numb and tingling uncomfortably the way he remembered his hands feeling when he was a kid and forgot to wear gloves when he made a snowman. The ice had melted away quickly, fortunately, but he’d only been touching Snart for _seconds_.

“Can’t say I’m a fan, no,” Barry responded as evenly as he could, shaking his hand out as the feeling began to return to it. Warily, he took a step towards Snart to circle around to his side. “That’s, uh. That’s new.”

“Among other things,” Snart added cryptically.

“Such as?” Barry prompted, finally making it around to stand a respectful, conversational distance in front of Snart again. He looked the other man over for any potential tells and blinked expectantly.

“Haven’t really taken it for a test run. I’d hate to be the one who broke our little _deal_ ,” Snart rolled his shoulders, reaching up to brush away the last of the ice.

The realization hit Barry with an impossibly wide grin. “Oh.. _ohmigod._ You want me to help you learn how to use your powers?”

Snart leveled a glower at the excitable CSI. “I‘m somehow miraculously back from the dead and, oh, by the way,” Snart’s fingers held a count of ongoing offenses, “apparently the _multiverse_ was reset, but _this_ is what finally gets your attention?”

Barry raised his hands, both to quell Snart’s ire and to demonstrate he meant no harm. “Well, I mean, the multiverse thing is kinda still new but it’s been over a month and— wait, how long have you _been_ here?”

Snart’s lips curled, “Oh, ‘bout a month, give or take.”

Barry’s mouth hung open, “So you’ve just—“ Barry cut himself off, pacing away at the sudden rush of frustrated, horrified empathy. “Am I the first person you’ve talked to who even knows about— y’know, _everything_ before?”

Snart’s expression had shuttered into something feigning guarded indifference, his gaze cast toward where the shadows traced over brick. “Seems that way.”

“Shit,” Barry breathed out, and stopped himself short of offering comfort because he knew what he would have wanted in that moment might not exactly be welcome. “I’m sorry, I’ll. Yes, okay? Whatever I can do, okay, I’ll help.”

“Didn’t ask for your help, Scarlet,” Snart bit out, the set of his brow dangerous again.

“Well, I think we both know I’m gonna help you now whether you ask for it or not, so can we skip all the posturing and get to the part where you agree to let me take you to S.T.A.R. Labs?” Barry could hear the edge of a whine when it began to crest in his voice, but he’d worked over the years to turn it into something more authoritative.

Snart regarded him silently, clearly biting back whatever barbs sharpened on his tongue. “Two conditions,” he said at last, and Barry prompted him to continue with a nod. “One, I’m not your lab rat. Doc wants to get the vitals, fine, but I’m not some fun new science project.”

“ ‘Course not,” Barry agreed easily.

“Two,” Snart continued as if he hadn’t heard Barry, “I tell you I want to leave, you let me leave. No questions, no puppy dog eyes, no speeches. You back me up if your little friends get any ideas, and if I need you to give me a lift out, you run me out like your life depends on it. Got it?”

“I’m not your personal taxi service,” Barry began, but finally realized what the edge he’d been trying to identify in Snart’s expression was: uncertainty. And Barry couldn’t imagine many things that must have scared Leonard Snart - meticulous, cunning, patient, controlled, _observant_ Leonard Snart - more than waking up to find he didn’t know the world around him the way he thought he did. The fight leached out of Barry’s protest, giving way to a tight sigh to hide his revelation behind. “Fine. Yeah, agreed.”

The thief watched Barry for a long moment, then made a showy motion of adjusting his gloves. “Well, before you go sweeping me off my feet to parts unknown, I probably don’t need to remind you to handle with care.”

Barry had tracked the graceful gestures of Snart’s hands, “Yeah, I got that. Does the freezing thing just _happen_ when anyone else gets too close, or…?”

“Should be fine, you just caught me in a particularly chilly moment,” Snart hedged, but shrugged. “No problems with my sister, but she’s a special case.”  
  
Barry’s eyes snapped back to Snart, wide. “Oh my gosh, Lisa, is she—”  
  
“She’s _fine_ ,” Snart held up a finger to shush the speedster mid-concern. “Also, still entirely normal, in case you were wondering. But this isn’t about her.”

“Right, yeah, sorry. Good, though, that she’s.. good,” Barry finished lamely, unsure how to best approach running them back while making sure he didn’t freeze halfway there.

“Barry,” Snart snapped, “are we going or not?”

“Yeah, yes. Going.” Barry got close enough to breach Snart’s personal space again, his hands hovering over the other man’s biceps for a moment before he gently grabbed ahold. And waited. 

Snart raised an eyebrow, “We waiting for Scotty to beam us up?”

“No, just. Wanted to see how long I had before I needed to let go. I don’t wanna drop you when I’m running several hundred miles an hour,” Barry explained a little absently, clearly focusing on where his hands were in contact with Snart.

A snort gusted against Barry’s cheek, and he seemed to register how close they were standing. Barry abruptly nodded, “We should be good! Okay, going now!”  
  
Barry ran, not giving Snart time for whatever snarky rejoinder he might’ve had.

They made it to S.T.A.R. Labs without incident, but Barry could swear his breath misted in the air when he finally let Snart go in the middle of the cortex.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a change-up with this chapter, both in terms of PoV and narrative pacing! I grappled with how to situate things for Barry’s relationship to Iris, and juggled a lot of ideas around before finally settling on this. Because, gosh, I adore Iris and she deserves all the good things in every universe.  
> I wanted to get the basic post-Crisis worldstate establishment out and done so I could finally get to putting Len and Barry together on the same page. I hope it’s intelligible to folks regardless of how familiar you are with the events of Crisis.  
> Thank you for reading; I’d love to know what you think! ♥
> 
> You can also find me on the ColdFlash Discord server, or at [hautecoldture.tumblr.com](https://hautecoldture.tumblr.com)


	3. Walk-in Appointment

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One month after awakening in the new reality, Leonard Snart finally gets some answers (and ends up with even more questions).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Enormous thanks to the the kind folks who beta-read and continued to cheerlead me through this chapter: [Fancy_Dragonqueen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fancy_Dragonqueen), [Kasai_Hasumi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kasai_Hasumi), and [Kateera](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kateera/pseuds/Kateera).  
>   
> And boundless adoration & thanks to the ColdFlash Discord server, y'all are truly a hug for my heart ♥

A ghost of too many sensations raced over Leonard’s skin as time resumed its flow around him. The Flash had run with him before, but the nauseating upheaval of senses he’d been expecting wasn’t what had greeted him when Barry finally set off into his speed with him in tow.

Instead, it was as if he was back within an echo of all he’d seen between his end and new beginning; this time, however, it felt like a thrumming pulse hitting harmonies with his breaths, chased by sharp ozone and a thrilling sense of potential. That indescribable _something_ he always sensed when the speedster came near, only amplified until it sang through him, promising more than he could ever—

Leonard shook his head, slamming his eyes shut as he caught up to concrete reality. Barry still held onto him, though slightly off to his side now with one hand on his arm while the other carefully braced against his shoulder, offering a steady grounding where Leonard swayed slightly on his feet.

“Hey, you okay?” Concern tinged the speedster’s question.

Leonard found calm in the breath he took between six and nine seconds; opened his eyes after four more. “Fine. Not a big fan of rollercoasters.” 

Though his gaze only caught Barry in its corner, he didn’t have to look full-on at the kid to know his answer probably didn’t do much to ease the worry he wore. He could also feel that something of his ability was leaching the heat from the air around him, could see it in the gust of warm breath; he reigned in his control.

He didn’t get long to catch his bearings before another voice piped up, “ _Heeeey_ Barr, you didn’t say Leo was visiting! What _up,_ Citizen? You finish all of SG-1 yet? You are gonna _love_ Atlantis, my dude, I’m tellin’ ya.”

Cisco Ramon’s rapid-fire rambling was getting closer with every word, and the need to assess his surroundings provided more than enough of an adrenaline push for Leonard’s bearings to sharpen. He firmly folded away the residual cascade of _too much_ from the speedster’s run; he shoved it into a place he’d process _later_. He felt Barry’s hands slowly withdraw as he straightened, and found that fortunately there weren’t any other people in the immediate vicinity.

“Hey Cisco. So, uh. Long story, but,” Barry’s voice paused, and Leonard was tempted to look for the telltale flicker of when Barry dropped into his superspeed to cheat time. His reflexive curl of a smirk deepened at the thought, and he shifted his stance enough to keep both of the young heroes in view. He could tell Barry was looking at him as if silently pleading for Leonard to explain himself. While Leonard had been entertaining the notion of speaking up, the alternative of fortified silence was far more appealing.

Barry’s explanation was about as graceful as he was, which wasn’t saying much. “He’s, uh. _Our_ Leonard Snart— as in, our old reality’s Captain Cold. The one who went with the Legends? That’s—this is him.”

Leonard favored Cisco with a moment of eye contact just to appreciate his reaction.

The bright red Twizzler jutting from Cisco’s mouth visibly drooped, then fell to the floor. “No way.”

“Nice to see you too, Ramon,” Leonard responded.

“Dude, how the _frak?!”_ Cisco’s voice escalated a few octaves.

Barry hastened to add, “Yeah, I know, still haven’t worked out all the details of how, exactly, but he’s also a metahuman now?” 

“Uh, what?” Cisco’s surprised disbelief crested into curiosity, and Leonard moved away from the two excitable scientists, aiming himself toward one of the cluttered desks where an absurdly large Big Belly Burger cup sat. Picking it up, he isn’t surprised to find that the ridiculous thing still has plenty of liquid sloshing around inside. Leonard turned enough to watch them as he gave them a little demonstration.

Focusing on the point of contact where his hand met the wax-coated paper of the cup, Leonard exercised a degree of the finesse he’d won since his first accidental feat. The now-familiar numb tingle of his ability slid through him, spreading through his fingertips, and he felt the temperature adjust to his whim as the cup’s contents froze solid. 

From grab to flourish, the act is a matter of seconds that Leonard only drew out for the sake of showmanship. A few steps had him close enough to hold the cup out to Ramon, and he gave his ability a final touch to lightly frost over the surface as if it had been sitting within a freezer for weeks. 

“Seems I don’t need the toy any more to live up to my moniker,” Leonard says.

Cisco gaped at the demonstration, wide eyes darting to Barry who gave him a nod that seemed to be affirmation enough for him to reach out and take the cup from where it dangled in Leonard’s fingers. Cisco inspected its exterior, then pried loose the lid and held the cup upside down; its contents didn’t budge. “Dude,” he breathed, finally looking from the cup back to the thief. “I am _so_ good at names.”

Barry snorted, and Leonard gave no outward indication other than calculated indifference.

“Frost is gonna have a _field day_ with this. Caitlin, too, obviously,” Cisco set off again, still inspecting the frozen cup. Something seemed to occur to him then, and he looked up to gauge the reaction from the other two. “We.. _are_ telling Caitlin, right?”

Well, that was interesting; Team Flash keeping secrets wasn’t how Leonard had thought the little team of heroes would be running after all these years, but he was still bereft of far more information than he’d like.

“Yeah, we—” Barry started, but Leonard cut in to speak over him.

“I’ve agreed to share with the class, seeing as how you’re the closest thing to subject-matter experts,” Leonard explains, tucking the curl of his fingers against his chest. “And _Barry_ here wisely agreed to do it on my terms.”

Cisco shot Barry a look of wary mistrust. “Okay… so, what does that mean?”

“Nothing different from how we’d usually do things, just give Snart his space, okay?” Barry glanced toward Leonard, who—as usual—was watching them indirectly.

“Don’t worry, my intentions are pure as the driven snow,” Leonard drawled and earned a look of flat disbelief from Cisco.

“See, now _that_ makes me trust you _less_ ,” Cisco pointed at Leonard warily even as he flopped back into his chair at the helm of the cortex’s control center. “You want me to message Caitlin and see when she expects to be in today? I think Frost said something about art galleries, but I’m pretty sure she’d skip out early for this.”

Barry looked toward Leonard again but didn't get much of anything to answer his unasked question. “Let her know, but there’s no rush, okay?” His eyes lingered on the thief before returning to his friend. “There’s some stuff we can go through without her here to get started.”

Cisco’s brows raised in casual surprise, “You sure? … Alright, man. Lemme know if you need me, otherwise, you know where I’ll be.”

Cisco cast another glance toward Leonard, then turned his attention back to the console in front of him, quickly engrossed in whatever information the screens presented.

Leonard ever-so-slightly frowned. Compared to the wariness that had greeted him last, this almost felt.. anticlimactic. That wouldn’t do.

Ambling to lean against the side of the large desk, Leonard tilted his head to glance at the screens. “Cisco, before we leave you, one thing?” 

Once Ramon’s eyes were on him, Leonard continued. “Let Lisa know we’re all playing nice, she hasn’t heard from you in months and I’d hate to think she was worried over nothing.”

“Y...yeah, yep, on that,” Cisco responded in a tight breath, clearly taking the hint that ghosting Lisa Snart was _not_ an option. Extenuating circumstances or no.

“Good man,” Leonard dropped over his shoulder as he crossed the room to the speedster. “Well?”

Barry’s hands dug into the pockets of his jacket, “Follow me?” It came out uncertain, though he half-turned toward where Leonard could see medical equipment in one of the clear-walled areas.

Leonard’s hard-won instinctual wariness tightened his posture, but he waved a hand to indicate his assent to follow Barry’s lead.

❅

The sight of all the Labs’ tech dug in a reinforcing reminder of why he was here.

It had been a month since Leonard had awoken, somehow miraculously _very much_ alive, with the fun added twist of abilities ironically suited to his chilly super-persona. 

He hadn’t yet decided if he liked that there was a cosmic sense of humor with him in its sights.

After processing through the initial maelstrom of it all, he’d spent his first week holed up in his apartment learning everything he needed to know about the life he was supposed to be living. It didn’t differ greatly from the one he’d known, though he continued encountering inconsistencies—large and small—which left him on edge. The most jarring was as he’d been working through cataloging his accounts, finding that one of his ciphers didn’t match the reference point he’d used in the reality before. A difference in the wider world was one thing, but the differences between him and whatever reality he’d been dropped into grated uncomfortably raw against a sense of unknowing that he was determined to outmaneuver.

All he’d seen, all he’d _known_ during that endless drift was a bit like staring into the sun; Leonard knew more of it was there, but he didn’t dare tug too much at the fractured threads of knowledge lest he unravel something far greater than he knew how to parse unprepared. He’d still been working through it, though, one string at a time (and, oh, there’s that cosmic sense of humor again). He knew he’d remember realities that were never his, or that had ceased to exist, if he tugged hard enough. Leonard also knew he didn’t want them.

Keeping his distance from Lisa had been both more and less easy. The relationship with his sister seemed, as far as he could tell, mostly unchanged. The echoes of what he’d seen while drifting in-between the destruction of the Oculus and awakening in this new reality, however, haunted him enough that he still found himself waking with a finger poised to call her and make sure she was alright. After the first week, he’d pieced together a cover for his uncharacteristic clinginess to the effect of being unsure how long his next stint with the Legends would be, and hadn’t his baby sister complained about not spending enough time together? Since his awakening, he’d managed to see her once a week—anything more would be far more suspicious than even he could explain away—and found his nerves a little less frayed each time.

Otherwise, he’d been learning. Filling in gaps on the differences in this new reality, the most important of which was himself. After a rather ungainly incident involving the kitchen sink (easily repairable), he found an old warehouse to use for experimentation instead. 

Leonard learned he held a new count alongside his sense for time; temperature, too, had become an innate awareness, and he honed it with the same precision as he did everything else. He’d learned something of what his abilities could do, what his limitations were, and how far he was able to push until his vision swam with the threat of unconsciousness. Well into his third week since awakening, he grimly admitted to himself that while his solo experimentation and meticulous testing were certainly helpful, it wasn’t _enough_.

That evening, his eye caught on live news coverage of the Flash facing off against another foe. The metahuman called “Gremlin” (another sterling moniker from Ramon, no doubt) was an immediately dismissed dead end in the realm of potential assets (angry factory worker who had begun causing heavy machinery to malfunction to enact revenge, screaming something vile and misogynistic that the news feed cut away from mid-slur, thankfully). Leonard had found himself transfixed, though, numbly realizing he’d not seen the Flash since awakening. 

The live feed of footage did its best to keep a safe distance from the action even as the Flash’s unmistakable trail of yellow-bright lightning zipped through the frame. Eventually, the Flash stood a short distance from the metahuman—saying something the news microphones couldn’t quite pick up—but Leonard could surmise his words were appropriately toeing the line of heroic and brazen.

The speedster’s suit was different from the last time Leonard had seen him in person, but it was still undoubtedly Barry Allen under that cowl. And, he realized, he’d _seen_ that suit before.

In that infinite time between the Oculus and waking up in this new reality.

Seeing Barry in all his heroic splendor now seemed to bring forth what Leonard still envisioned most vividly when he closed his eyes at night; the dance of lightning as it tried to outrun an inevitable end. He’d long ago made his peace with not putting a name to the fascination he held for the Flash. It was an interrogation of things that would lead someplace he had no interest in going at the moment, either. He’d done enough of that in his time aboard the Waverider. Done more than enough of it when he dared prod at the things he’d seen in the universal tapestry with its binding thread cut in sparks of gold.

It reminds him, then, of the avenue he’d been avoiding as he acquainted himself with his new abilities. There was a perfectly-accessible team of amicable experts who’d be eager at the opportunity to spend their time offering up whatever it took for him to hone every possible aspect of his powers. And, as the internet and a bit of simple deduction informed him, one of their very own was a metahuman with related abilities, no less; the frosty Doctor Snow was practically the perfect icing on that kismet cake.

He doubted even this universe’s Leonard Snart had been so cozy with Team Flash as to just waltz into their midst and coax them into a training session. In his conversations with Lisa, he’d gleaned enough to learn that it seemed their encounters had occurred much as they had in his recollection, albeit with some rather significant difference; apparently, the gun stolen from S.T.A.R. Labs had been a sort of method to focus his powers, possibly enhance them. Its function, however, seemed largely similar to the weapon he’d known. He could also tell that his sister still had a soft spot for Cisco Ramon, though she refused to discuss the subject any further after Leonard managed to find out they hadn’t been in touch over the past few months despite Lisa having made sure they exchanged numbers. His predicament aside, he was tempted to waltz into their woefully unsecured facility just to menace Cisco.

The brief conclusion to the confrontation between Flash and the disgruntled metahuman wasn’t much more than another series of rapid movements that the cameraperson could barely keep up with. By the time it was over, the metahuman looked to have been knocked out and temporarily restrained in a length of cargo strapping wound to pin his arms against his torso. Leonard barely listened to the reporters as they excitedly praised another job well-done by Central City’s hero; his attention was entirely on watching the Flash beckon over CCPD officers, who hurried to take over. Once the metahuman was secure, the Flash looked around and seemed to spot the news cameras. A boyish grin broke out over the hero’s features and he gave them a friendly wave, then ran off to whatever else his evening held.

It was time, Leonard decided, to catch up with the Scarlet Speedster.

❅

Barry led him from the cortex into one of the smaller rooms of the Labs with familiar ease, tugging a rolling chair over in one hand and a swing-arm mounted monitor around in the other. “Caitlin handles all the big medically relevant stuff, but there’s still plenty we can get started on,” he said, seeming to need to fill the silence. Barry looked away from tapping at the touchscreen of the monitor long enough to gesture for Leonard to take a seat in the chair.

Leonard opted instead to perch on the relatively clean desk nearby, hooking a heel onto one of its drawer handles.

Barry didn’t seem bothered by it in the slightest, though did glance aside at him with an amused snort. He looked to be about to speak again when Leonard snatched the conversation from him.

“How about we start with what happened to the multiverse?” Leonard broached casually; he’d considered saving the topic, but it’s clear he caught the speedster off-guard, which is precisely how the thief prefers it.

He had a front-row seat to watch how Barry Allen’s expression journeyed from surprise to dismay through to hurt and something deeper that he made a valiant attempt to hide behind controlled neutrality. For all he may have grown since Leonard had last seen him, Barry’s bleeding heart was still laid bare in a way that was all too easy to read. 

Barry’s shoulders rose and fell with a deep breath, and he took the few steps he needed to grab hold of the rolling chair again. He looked at it for a moment, seeming to consider using it for its intended purpose, but instead opted to slide his hands over the backrest, flexing his fingers against the solidity and using it as an oversized fidget toy.

“Yeah, okay.” Barry’s hazel gaze flicked from Leonard back out toward the cortex where Cisco was no doubt doing his utmost to pretend he wasn’t eavesdropping. Leonard catches how Barry has planted himself as if he’s preparing for a confrontation, but he suspects it’s less to do with him than it is the topic itself. 

“The multiverse,” Barry started, then after a silence that stretched far longer than is normal for the fastest man alive, said, “...ended.”

The quiet grief weighing down those words was something he’d never heard from the speedster before. 

Barry continued, “There was... We couldn’t stop it. In the end, there were only—” he paused as if correcting himself before he spoke, “—seven of us left. But we found a way to bring as much of it back as we could, keep as much of it as we knew how to.” 

Barry paused to rake a hand through his hair, head wilting between his shoulders as he shook it. “Most people don’t know it’s any different. The only ones who remembered everything initially were us seven until J’onn helped…” and Barry looked back at Leonard then, his gaze tight with that sharp focus of considering his next move.

“How is it that you remember what happened?” Barry asked him in a way that’s as hopeful as it is almost accusatory; Leonard would bristle if it weren’t clear that there’s far more than he has enough information to surmise.

Leonard tilted his head, regarding where Barry’s fingers had stilled and tightened over the back of the chair. He’d been expecting the question in one form or another, but he finds himself dulling the edge of his response.

“Not entirely sure,” he rolled a shoulder in a close approximation of a shrug. “The Oculus blew and took me with it. Thing is, it went places I’m pretty sure maps don’t exist for.” 

The speedster’s uncharacteristic stillness raised a sense of alarm in the part of Leonard’s mind that’s used to rapid threat assessment, and he glanced at Barry for a moment to reassure that instinct; he’s not sure how to read the guarded expression drawn there.

“You were outside of time,” Barry finally said slowly, hollowly, like he’s piecing things together from the fragments Leonard left implied. 

⚡️

Barry remembers the feeling of the Speed Force dragging against him as he ran at the Vanishing Point, how the familiar spark of possibility scattered away unlike he’d ever felt it. How he’d jarred himself out of its flow when it felt like running into a mountain at Mach 10.

The things he’d felt and seen in what—to him—was a span of seconds, but had filled months for the others as they tried to find a solution.

He hadn’t discussed it with them, how he’d been running between the universes, or what he'd seen shortly after when he was navigating the Speed Force with Oliver ( _The Spectre,_ he reminds himself, but it’s still Oliver) to get them all out of the Vanishing Point. Barry had seen too many things, revisited times and places he knew too well, and some he hadn’t known at all.

Looking at Snart now, he realizes the fleeting glance he’d caught of the thief may have been more than just his memory. Theories begin spiraling out and he has to catch himself before going off on a tangent, instead thinking aloud as restless feet send him pacing across the room. 

“Because the Vanishing Point exists outside of time, something about it must have.. insulated you. I don’t know how the Oculus worked, but I—we were at the Vanishing Point when everything ended.” The last few words he has to push past to continue. “It’s possible that when I ran us out through the Speed Force, it got you out too.”

Barry stares at Snart and feels something kickstart in his chest.

The old feeling of failure that had haunted him with a splinter wedged into his heart, reminding him how he couldn’t save everyone, personified in a teasing smirk.

“My hero,” Snart drawls drily, his cool gaze regarding Barry like he’s an interesting puzzle. The thief looks like he’s about to continue, but twists a hand as he turns his head to rest it on his bent wrist. Almost as if he’s neatly switching to a different thought. “So, that all? You figured out how to just outrun the problem?”

Barry’s pacing had stopped somewhere halfway across the room, so he turned himself back toward the chair and finally sat down in it, folding his forearms across the headrest to sit in it backward. “You really want the long version?”

Snart’s eye catches him. “Every word.”

Brows bumping at the magnitude of that request, Barry still nods. “Okay. Long version it is.”

❅

When Caitlin arrives, she’s greeted by a wide-eyed Cisco who waves her away from going into the lab room where she can see Barry backwards-straddling a chair and deep in conversation with Leonard Snart.

Cisco’s message had given her an idea of the basics, but seeing the man perched on the desk is still a little surreal. Stranger things had happened, though, and she felt a chill slide of sardonic amusement from Frost.

“How long have they been in there?” She asks Cisco, setting her bag down on a free chair.

Cisco shook his head, glancing back toward the room. “Since before I messaged you, so at least an hour. It’s been, like, _freaky_ quiet. But the intense sort of quiet, you know? So I think they’re probably talking about heavy stuff.”

Caitlin arched a brow at the engineer. “You think?”

Cisco held his hands up, “Hey, I only eavesdrop if shit’s gettin spicy or we need intel. This ain’t that.”

Caitlin tilted a disbelieving look at Cisco, which earned her a fond eyeroll. “Okay, yeah, I dipped out after they started talking Crisis stuff. Can you blame me?”

She patted his shoulder. “Not at all. I’ll wait until they come out, then.” She settled into her chair at the cortex workstation she favors, which affords her an easy peripheral view of the room where the other two carry on their conversation.

❅

Barry’s explanation spares no details, which Leonard supposes is to be expected from someone whose chosen profession centered on isolating minutia. It’s rare, though, that Leonard doesn’t have to prompt for more information; instead, he quietly listens and is pleasantly surprised that an arched brow is all the nudge the speedster needs to expound on certain points. 

As he processes the staggering gravity of Barry’s words, Leonard also studies the speedster himself. It’s been years for Barry since the last time they’d interacted (for Leonard, just under two months). The coltish clumsiness he remembers is still there, but it seems he’s grown more confident and comfortable in his own skin. There’s also a tired mournfulness weighing down his shoulders that hadn’t been there before, and Leonard suspects the Crisis is only the latest contribution.

It’s another reminder of how the things he thought he’d find familiar are instead jarringly changed, but at least with Barry Allen, it seems as if the speedster is content to pick things right back up from how they left them.

In Siberia.

When Barry Allen snatched him scant days before Leonard Snart threw away the plan for good, or so he’d thought.

The slide of icy calculated fury, resentment, and several other things Leonard doesn’t quite want to label feels a bit like he’s dipped a hand into ice water, and he takes up a pen to keep his fingers occupied lest he outwardly manifests any of that chill. It was a thought he’d not dwelled on much since he’d awoken, but it returns as Barry says something about the rules of timelines and the multiverse. Strange, Leonard thinks sardonically, how the rules hadn’t mattered when the Flash had wanted his help. 

Strange again, his thought sharpens bitterly, how the rules applied when it meant his life was forfeit.

It’s a petulant roil he pushes away, understanding the layers of complication better than most might. Still, he suspects it’ll remain a splinter in his thoughts until he either presses it deeper or pries it loose. Now was the time for neither, so Leonard files it away for an opportunity when his tongue is feeling sharper.

He notices Doctor Snow when she enters (doesn’t need to turn, he catches her reflection in a surface that’s also reassured him that Ramon had long-since stopped eavesdropping, which was… interesting), and finds a point in her favor when she doesn’t interrupt. 

It seems Team Flash, after all these years, has learned a measure of the merits of not rushing into everything.

Leonard’s attention returns to focus more fully on Barry as the speedster winds down, tucking into a lighthearted tangent talking about the man named Leo he’d initially mistaken Leonard for (and what an interesting thought that was). He mentions more names and superheroic alter-egos that someone other than Leonard might take in awe instead of as a list of people to research later.

He’s struck again, listening to Barry describe the state of the multiverse as it is now, how the fastest man alive carries signs of change even in the way he fidgets (a slow rock twisting the chair thirty degrees to the right, back to center, then to the left). It also speaks of a degree of relaxed tension that Leonard might remind the speedster he’s unwise to let lapse around him, if circumstances were different (maybe later).

Barry stretches his arms behind his neck, scrubbing both hands through his hair forward, then back; the rake of fingers leaves the thick tuft of dark strands looking as if he’s just finished a run. He glances out into the cortex, seeming to notice the rest of the world outside their little room for the first time since he’d started talking (sixty-seven minutes ago).

“Oh, looks like Caitlin’s here,” Barry says, and it sounds a little dazed. 

Leonard studies him again, asking drily, “So eager to pawn me off, Scarlet?”

Barry’s head snaps toward him. “What? No! If anything,” Barry seems to realize he’s been doing most of the talking over the past hour, ducking sheepishly. “I wouldn’t blame you if you’re tired of hearing me talk.”

Leonard gives the pen in his fingers a final twist, then tucks it into his jacket’s inner pocket. “Wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t want to hear it.” 

Barry nods, dragging the toe of one shoe against the chair’s base, tapping against the wheel of a caster as if to substitute for scuffing a kicked rock. “Even after all that, if you’ve got any questions—”

“Several. But they can wait.” Leonard slides off his perch atop the desk to stand, eyeing the speedster. “Let’s not keep the good doctor waiting any longer, hm?”

“Yeah, right,” Barry agrees, though it comes out like it’s an automatic thing rather than an honest response, and he pushes to his feet as he guides the chair back under the desk it had come from, then repockets his hands. “Like I mentioned, I imagine Caitlin and Frost are gonna have plenty more insight.”

Leonard hums, smile tight at the thought; he had no eagerness for the Doctor’s examination, but he conceded the necessity to gain valuable insight. He had his suspicions about his own physiological changes, but even after leveraging what resources he could, the expertise and equipment of the Labs would be the best bet for certain details.

He doesn’t wait for Barry, turning to walk through the delicate invisible barrier holding their little acrylic and glass box of a room separate from incursion from the outside world. 

“Doctor Snow, I was told you take walk-ins,” Leonard drawls, and it seems like his voice startles both of the other scientists out of their concentration. 

To her credit, Snow stands. While she doesn’t offer her hand, she does approach and studies him momentarily. “I heard it was a unique case.” She glances at Barry, who Leonard sees in his peripheral vision give the doctor a nod.

“Lucky me,” Leonard observes, though dulls the edge he might have otherwise given it. It’s not without a hint of gratitude, but he’ll retain the thanks until after he’s learned what he can from this visit.

❅

The next twenty-six minutes are spent in the comfortable discomfort of Doctor Snow’s detached professional bedside manner, for which Leonard finds himself slightly more grateful when his preparedness to insist he retain his jacket (and all other layers) doesn’t come up. Snow, in contrast to the speedster, seems perfectly content to let silence stretch between rounds of information and tests.

He feels the prickle of being watched by the speedster like it’s a fingertip sliding across his nape; turning his head enough to confirm, Leonard catches Barry in the last second of butting his shoulder against the doorjamb.

“How’s it going?” Barry asks, cheer muted with a thread of polite curiosity.

“Doctor Snow was just about to ask me for a demonstration,” Leonard answers and is satisfied to see the doctor blink with surprise.

“Actually, yes,” she confirms slowly, then recenters herself as she pulls up a series of charts and statistics. “If you don’t mind,” she adds with the detached politeness of her professional demeanor.

Leonard tilts his head and shrugs slightly, tracing a gesture to underscore his assent. “Don’t worry, Doctor. I’m not getting cold feet just yet.”

Barry scoffs, which deepens the curl of Leonard’s smirk with satisfaction.

“Well,” Caitlin continues, “I guess we should just start with monitoring your vitals as you try to do something small and controlled to—”

Leonard twists his wrist, frost riming his fingertips as ice forms around his hand in a crystalline glove. “Will that do?”

“Excellently, thank you,” Caitlin responds, a thread of excitement almost cracking through. “How long can you keep that up?” She asks, busily annotating something she sees in the arrays of readings.

 _Until I pass out_ , Leonard thinks, but says instead, “Hours.”

Caitlin’s brows rise, “Interesting, then it must not be too taxing on your metabolism to maintain,” she observes, thinking aloud as she looks back toward the data.

“Any idea how similar his powers are to Frost’s?” Barry asks.

“So far, it seems like there may be some shared aspects, but Leonard’s abilities are much more attuned to the manipulation of ambient temperature and, I think, rapid conversion of atmospheric molecules. It’ll take more tests to be sure.”

“And what would ‘more tests’ entail?” Leonard asks. It’s casual in the way that makes it toe the line of becoming a warning.

“Well,” Caitlin glances at Barry again, “it usually helps to set up a sort of training session, as if you were planning to use your abilities out in the field. Controlled scenarios elicit more authentic data.”

He had expected something to that effect, but he tips his head toward the speedster. “So what, you’re gonna give me my own training montage? That’s cute, but I’m not a wide-eyed origin story.”

The speedster grins—and there’s an edge of the challenge that’s been missing since they reached the Labs—as he pushes off the wall and crosses to glance at what the doctor’s readouts indicate, but keeps his attention centered on Leonard.

“Which means we can skip the training wheels and get right to the good stuff,” Barry says, and _there’s_ the cocky hero.

Leonard turns his head enough to regard Barry, then fluidly slides from the medical exam bed to stand just within the outer edge of Barry’s personal space, catching his eyes with a leveled challenge. “Then what are we waiting for?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I ended up reshuffling parts initially intended for this chapter to come into play later, which I hope shakes out to read better. There are aspects I'm SO EAGER to get to in this fic, but I'm also leaning hard into that good good slow burn.
> 
> Something I also always tend to do is put a lot of significance into how characters not only refer to each other, but themselves; Len/Leonard/Snart/Cold is a prime example.
> 
> Hope folks continue to enjoy reading as much as I am figuring out how to write it ♥


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